


All These Things About Me (you never can tell)

by ViolentlyRed



Category: Community (TV)
Genre: Britta is Britta and I love her, Britta is sad, Britta owns crocs, Britta will be okay someday, Britta/Troy (mentioned), Comfort, Drinking, Drinking & Talking, Drinking to Cope, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Episode Tag, Episode: s04e11 Basic Human Anatomy, Friendship, Gen, He is trying his best, Introspective as shit, Jeff Winger has /grown/, Jeff Winger is a good friend, John Hughes movies, Male-Female Friendship, Red gets attached to fictional characters again, They'll Be Ok, They're important, both of them are their trainwreck selves, but it's endearing, i promise this is good lol, rightfully so, s04e11 Basic Human Anatomy, the aftermath of s4e11, the community fic that no one asked for
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-10
Updated: 2020-05-10
Packaged: 2021-03-03 00:41:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,435
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24115924
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ViolentlyRed/pseuds/ViolentlyRed
Summary: Tag to season 4, episode 11: Basic Human Anatomy.Jeff contemplates as Britta copes with everything in her own way.Or, Britta is sad, Jeff is a better person than he thinks he is, and they are ultimately in this together.
Relationships: Britta Perry & Jeff Winger
Comments: 8
Kudos: 44





	All These Things About Me (you never can tell)

**Author's Note:**

> Lol guess who's finally watching Community for the first time?
> 
> I'm--I'm kind-of attached to this show, ngl. It's my emotional support sitcom. And this is the first thing in a little while that I've actually wrote for pure enjoyment, so it's nice, I guess. Idk. Quarantine is hard, y'all. Sending love to all of you reading this. 
> 
> Anyway--this is my take on what happened after the events of Basic Human Anatomy, because I'm a hurt/comfort SLUT, first of all, and I've found that I really like exploring complex relationships from the pov of emotionally complex characters. Aka Jeff Winger and his Daddy Issues and his Ego and his Feelings about his Friends. 
> 
> I'm projecting. I don't really know anymore. I apologize for weirdness if you find any. Do I know how to write?
> 
> The working google doc title was "The community fic that no one asked for". The actual title comes from "Whirring" by The Joy Formidable, which is a magnificently song and fits to this fic like a puzzle piece, I think. 
> 
> Enjoy!

He knows the situation, and he knows that Britta should be upset. 

She stays dry-eyed in the restaurant as Troy pays (insisting that its his treat, which Jeff thinks is nice because it's kind-of the least the guy could do, after having his best friend break up with her).

Jeff studies her.

The bad part is, Shirley and Annie aren't here. They're usually more in-tune with emotional things like this, ergo the Bathroom Talk lesson, but Jeff isn't as big of an asshole as he lets on. (Either that, or he knows Britta better than he thinks and he'd rather have the former to dissect, thankyouverymuch.) 

Initially, Britta rode with Abed (pretending to be Troy) in Troy's car. 

Britta, who hangs back as they walk into the parking lot and pairs off with Jeff, Britta who tries to act nonchalant about it when he suggests she ride with him back to campus. She mumbles an insult as they walk to his car, and Jeff hesitates for a moment before he comprehends the lack of life in the statement. 

He inserts the key and starts the car and she takes a deep, shuddering breath as he shuts his door, out of earshot of the other two. Jeff, having not looked her way since she entered the car, stares out the windshield and the words taste weird when he asks, "Are you okay?"

She doesn't answer for a moment, 

and then a tear slides down her face.

And Jeff sighs, feels that dip in the pit of his stomach, that drop, that nuanced little ache whenever he sees these people (who have become so begrudgingly close) genuinely upset. 

Britta sniffles, and the way she tries to make it quiet is so painfully obvious that it makes him feel even worse. 

"Britta." 

And he knows its difficult. He knows she has a hard time being this raw in front of people, and he knows its why they didn't work, because he's the same way. 

She wipes her eyes with the sleeve of her jacket, looking down into her lap.

And he feels like he's not getting anywhere and he's not used to being placed in situations like this with her, so he asks, plainly, "Do you want a napkin?"

She sniffles and nods, hiding behind her hair that's draped around her face, escaped from behind her ear. He pulls out a napkin from his center console and offers it to her, and she laughs wetly at the sentiment. 

It's unabashedly him, and he knows it, and he grins and teases her, "Are you laughing at my napkins?"

She smiles wetly at her lap and nods, dabs at her cheeks, says "sorry" because that's the type of person that she is. (When did he even figure this out?)

And he tells her not to apologize, but she doesn't take it to heart, and she wipes her tears away and stows it all behind her stupid blonde hair, behind her hardened, fuck-the-patriarchy bravado. 

This is what they do. They don't have conversations like this, Jeff's not a deep,, introspective person. He doesn't make these kinds of connections.

She draws in a big, clearing breath and tells him that they have a project to finish.

He drives.

She turns the radio on, and Jeff thinks that maybe she's matured a lot since they met, that maybe she really isn't all that bothered by it--the fact that she's going to work on a project with her ex directly after their breakup is testament to this. But she sniffles and mouths along to a song on the radio and she's trying so hard to be herself right now that its hurting his teeth. 

"You gonna be okay?" he asks as they slide into a parking spot. 

She nods. "Yeah, I'm just. You know. Gettin' through it." 

He nods slowly and watches her scrub the last of the redness away from her eyes in the flip-down mirror, swiping away the remains of any emotion, she's gotta gather herself. 

He gets it. 

She takes a deep breath and they exit the car, walk into the school, and she keeps her gaze towards the floor as they meet up with the rest of the group. 

Pierce has done their project for them, and its a shock and Jeff feels a pang in his chest, something bittersweet as they all marvel at the posters. 

He claps Pierce on the shoulder when they all leave, and he pretends to not notice when Britta hangs back with Troy for a moment. 

  
-  
  


Its nine pm and he's sort-of drunk, because some things never change, and this is what it means to be an adult, he thinks. And instead of zoning out on the hockey game that's glowing from his TV, he finds himself reading through his texts with Britta. 

And he thinks about how she's probably not with Annie, because Annie lives with Troy, and he thinks about how Shirley is at parent-teacher conferences tonight, and he thinks about the things he and Britta have in common, and he thinks about why he's thinking about these things. He's really not even that drunk, he just...

...Should he text her? 

No. He shouldn't, because it would be too obvious that he cares. Which he doesn't. So.

Britta is an adult, she can deal with things by herself, she's fine. Everything's _fine_.

To: Britta 

10:07 pm: _Hey_

He turns off his phone screen and stares at his ceiling.

His phone vibrates. 

From: Britta

10:09 pm: _Hi_

Jeff sighs. 

10:10: _How are you?_

There isn't a response for a while, and Jeff starts to assume she's doing something to get her mind off of the day. 

10:17: _Honestly?_

10:17: _Rough_

10:17: _Have you talked to Annie_ _or_

_Shirley about it all?_

10:18: _I should, but I haven't yet_

Jeff sighs again. 

10:18: _Are you drunk?_

10:18: _No. I wanna be_

10:18: _Lmao_

10:19: _Long shot, but I know you're probably feeling shitty--do you wanna come over?_

10:20: _I've still got a bottle of your nasty wine left over from Christmas and there's a John Hughes marathon on FX_

10:20: _If you want_

10:24: ... 

She types for three minutes because she's the worst. 

10:24: _can I wear pajamas_

He doesn't realize his brow is furrowed until he relaxes his face.

10:25: _yes, trainwreck_

  
  


She knocks on his door forty minutes later and she's wearing Christmas pajama pants and a tee-shirt that says " _Suck it, Big Pharma_ " and Jeff is glad she showed up. Glad she showed up like this. 

"Hi," she says miserably. 

"You look…" 

" _Don't,_ " she says, glaring at him, and the scrunchie is falling out of her hair and it's enough to make him crack a smile. 

She wanders in and sits on his couch, slipping her feet out of--

"Oh my _God_ , Britta, are those _Crocs?"_

She turns a puffy face to glare at him while he brings over a wine bottle and a glass. "Shove it. Let me rot in peace, Winger," and then, softer, "They're my sad shoes." 

Jeff smirks and hands her the bottle, sinks into the cushion next to her. He lets himself stare for a moment because this is the worst he's seen Britta dress, ever. 

"Sad shoes? Jesus, Britta," but it's scornless and she knows it. 

There's a lull, and they both start drinking. 

"I didn't think I'd be this upset," she says, eyes glued to a commercial on TV. 

Jeff turns to her, watches the reflection of an infomercial bounce in her eyes. 

"I mean. It's not like I planned for it to happen, but." She looks down into her wine glass, not meeting Jeff's eyes because she can never meet his eyes when she's talking about something they both know is important.

Jeff sips his scotch. "You're allowed to be upset about it." His therapist has told him this. The newer one.

Britta huffs out a dry laugh. "Thanks." 

Jeff remembers when Abed went on his spiel about " _no relationships within the group_ " and thinks that while, yes, this may have been avoidable, it was also inevitable. 

(Is it bad to say that he's glad it wasn't with Britta and him?)

She's too authentic. That's the problem. 

She's too real, and Jeff believes it. It drives him crazy to know that she doesn't deserve to feel this shitty, and if this is what caring about someone feels like, then its stupid. He'd almost rather be an asshole and not akin to these kinds of things. 

(That's a lie.) 

Britta drains her glass and Jeff resigns himself to letting them be trainwrecks together, for the night. 

  
  


She is wine drunk and he is more than tipsy, and they're cackling at the credits of Sixteen Candles, and Jeff cannot believe this is her favorite movie. 

"It's _GOOD_ ," she says loudly, wide eyes and a wider grin, "Jeff, this movie is literally so good, I don't understand--" 

"They would not _forget_ her sixteenth birthday! They just wouldn't--"

Britta laughs and leans back into the couch, and the night is booze-tinged but Jeff isn't complaining.

And it's not insincere, either, with her knee touching his and her loud, tipsy laugh. Its fitting in a way that there's a ring on his coffee-table because she didn't use a coaster, and its fitting in a way that they're in Community College and they're never gonna grow up enough to pretend things don't hurt.

Maybe they don't have to. 

Britta is sad. Jeff knows this. 

"Are we watching Grosse Pointe Blank?" 

Britta casts a look at the empty bottle of wine on the table and Jeff rolls his eyes. He's only being this candid because they're drunk and she's Britta. "I have more wine in the fridge. You can crash here tonight, if you want." 

She tilts her head to the side, studies him for a second and he panics for a second because maybe he read something wrong, but she smiles, with hazy eyes and that dumb, loopy, drunk Britta grin that he would do anything for. 

"It better not taste like shit." 

It does taste like shit, but its 14% so she doesn't care that much. 

Somehow they end up paused in the middle of Grosse Pointe Blank, and they're leaning on the edge of sloppy-drunk but its still endearing. Blurry and smeared and forced together, and still so natural. And Britta is telling him to find some popcorn but he's insisting he doesn't have any. Even though he thinks he does, but he's lying to her because he lives to give her a hard time, and vice versa.

She flops back down against the couch, their feet touching each other on the coffee-table. "Jeff," she says. 

"Britta." 

"Thank you for being a good friend." 

And the way she says it, absent of anything, bare for him to pick apart, is what makes him turn his head.

She stares at him with glassy eyes, stringy hair, challenging him to say something sarcastic, to ruin the moment with his crackling exterior, with sarcasm or defense or something else. 

He sighs, and the feeling in his chest returns, the same metallic pang that he felt when he saw Pierce's banners. 

"Anytime, loser," he softly says, and the corners of Britta's dumb eyes crinkle as she takes another sip of the horrible refrigerator wine. 

"If you don't bring out the popcorn that I _know_ you have in the next five seconds, Jeff Winger, I swear to God--"

"You'll what? What are you going to do? Hit me with your trash shoes?"

" _Sad_ _Shoes!_ "

(He lets her make microwave popcorn and she sways in his kitchen to the popping, unaware of the way he watches her in the reflection of his phone screen from the couch.)

  
  


An hour later, and the credits roll. There is popcorn in the creases of Jeff's tee-shirt; he is drunker than he has been in a while. 

"I can call a cab," Britta slurs, moving to pick popcorn off of the couch cushions. 

Jeff rolls his eyes and there's no pretense anymore. His speech is loose, but he's trying to be careful. "Not like you haven’t stayed the night before." 

( _Trying_.)

She smiles lazily at the ceiling, but her eyes aren't quite in it. "Jeff." 

"I didn’t mean--I’m not talking about that. You know I wouldn't--" and _shit,_ now he's getting too defensive, and it's all about to sour, he can feel it in the bottom of his stomach. 

She blinks at the ceiling. 

Jeff chews the inside of his cheek, feigns apathy and tries to save face. "Sleep in my bed, sleep on the couch if you want, I can sleep on the couch, I don’t... I don't care." 

She frowns.

He walks drunkenly into his bathroom, stumbling through the steps of a skin-care routine, and he's vain and he knows this. 

And he does care, and now he feels bad, and when he shuffles out of the bathroom, she's sitting on the edge of his mattress. 

"I don't want this to be a thing," she mumbles quietly, sobered by the soft light from a lamp on his bedside table. She looks dazed, face puffy. It’s been a long day.

"Britta," he says. And maybe they're a little too drunk or just too sad, but neither of those things can be helped now. 

(And it disgusts him to think that five years ago, a lawyer without a degree, and a fake anarchist, they would be naked already.)

She crawls into his bed and Jeff doesn’t know what they’ll ever be. He swallows past a bitter taste that blooms in the back of his mouth and walks over to his side of the bed, contemplating despite the slowness of the gears turning in his head. 

Words stick like peanut butter in the back of his throat, like whiskey that burns when he swallows. _I’ll sleep on the couch, if that would be better._

She’s curled up under his silk sheets, and Jeff hates the way that she’s still pretty, even though her puffy eyelids are like little crescents in the streetlight that pokes through the crack in his curtains. 

He walks quietly into the kitchen and fills up a glass of water, walks back and sets it on the bedside table just to give himself something to do. He’s drunk, and something’s wrong. 

“Goodnight, Britta.” 

She’s already asleep. Lips parted, warm and human and breakable, folded between his sheets, Britta, Britta, Britta. Infuriating. 

He exhales.

Empty bottles sit by the sink and it looks like she tried to clean up a bit, and he feels an ache in his chest. There's still popcorn on his couch, but he reasons that he's too drunk to care (he is) and lays his pillow on the arm, curls up with a blanket that is soft.

His mind drifts until exhaustion finally takes over. 

He wakes up to a presence near him, warm lighting, tangerine pink, and someone presses a kiss to his temple, soft lips, gentle. 

"I've gotta go—therapy at eleven," she says quietly. 

He inhales and nods. Her fingertips are light on his cheekbone, soft as she leans on the back of the couch, looks at him, swollen eyelids, messy hair, splintered in the morning sun by the light that beams in from the cracks of his blinds. Britta, Britta, Britta, severe face softened by morning light.

"Thank you, Jeff," she whispers, sad smile, gray eyes and he feels his heart sink. 

"Anytime," he murmurs, half-asleep, and he realizes how much he means it when he hears the door click shut. 

(He peels himself off of the couch and slips into his cold sheets, darkened room, and it feels nice as he sinks back into sleep.) 

  
  
  


From: Britta, 12:06 am

12:06: _hey_

12:06: _you're a good friend_

12:07: _I'm glad you're you--hope there's not_

_too much popcorn in your couch_

To: Britta Perry

1:12 pm: _Go take a nap_

He's the last to arrive Monday, and he tries to avoid her until she matches pace with him in the hall. 

"Hey!" she squawks, running after him, ankle boots clicking a frenzied little staccato as she struggles to match his pace. "Don't run away from me!"

He keeps his face perfectly neutral, he is cool as a cucumber. "I'm just walking to class." 

She purses her lips, pinched features and her dumb cheekbones and her eyes aren't that puffy anymore. Sometimes her face catches Jeff off-guard and then he remembers who she is and why she's here and how she talks like a cartoon villain. 

"Can it!" (Jeff makes a face at the expression.) "I just--" her expression falters. "I think I owe you a bottle of wine." 

"You don't _owe_ me anything, Britta, your abrasive presence is more than enough–"

"Jeff—"

He finally stops in the hallway, off-to-the-side so they aren't blocking traffic. He does not want to talk about it, because the more she wants to talk about it, the more she wants to talk about something that Jeff doesn't even really understand himself. 

She looks out of breath, and she _did_ just chase him down a hallway. "Just. I know we aren't the best at communicating." 

He grimaces. "Why--"

"Let me finish!" she counters. He closes his mouth. She takes a breath. "I know we're not that great at talking to each other about stuff," she says again, reproachfully, "But I just wanted to say thanks, for Saturday. And that... I really appreciate having you as a friend." 

"Britta--" 

"I'm not done, Jeff! Just--"

"Okay, okay, I'm sorry," and he kind of feels bad when she fixes her serious eyes on him, chin tilted up. "Keep going." 

She sighs. "Look. Just-- I'm trying to be better about acknowledging my feelings with the people I care about, and it's really hard for me, but--basically I just wanted to say thanks for being such a good friend on Saturday." 

She hugs her notebooks to her chest and looks up at him, and he tries to look away before she can lock eyes with him but she's too quick. 

After a million years, he sighs and closes his eyes. His head hurts, they aren't... they aren't _like_ this. They don't _do_ these conversations, and the fact that she's trying so hard is making him feel even worse, because he's actually not that good of a person, but she's paused, looking up a him with a face too similar to the one that says she's hanging off of every word.

He knows it's hard. "I'm glad you're around, too, Britta." 

It's the truth. 

She quirks a smile, and her eyes still look tired but at least she seems content. They keep walking. 

"You're almost bathroom-talk worthy. Do they have that for guys?" 

"Yeah, it's called "all of the women in our group just left at the same time to go to the bathroom." 

"That's fair." 

(And maybe he's never going to figure out what they are, or just how much she means.

Britta is an anomaly, a blip on a radar that seems so insignificant in the moment but has the power to change views and mend relationships and fight for useless causes. She's a crazy cat lady and a social justice warrior and she has flaws stacked on top of one another, she drives him crazy and her singing voice makes him want to punch something. 

She's a sadder, prettier Molly Ringwald, trying to figure out her life in a chapter that seems too far in to be the right place. 

Jeff knows more than anyone. He's seen the shitbags of the world, who stomp on everything around them as they try to maintain their status and grace. Britta walks with her earnest little footsteps in a community college hallway, and Jeff knows in his heart, in the ache in his chest cavity, that she is a good person who deserves good things.)

"You deserve good things," he tells her, just loud enough for her to hear. 

She studies him for a moment, chews her bottom lip, calculating his expression. He doesn't elaborate and she breaks out in a small smile, one that reaches her eyes. 

"High praise, coming from Jeff Winger," she says, but Jeff gets what she's trying to say in the unevenness of her voice and the way she doesn't look away after she's said it. 

She squeezes his elbow. His chest twinges and he follows her into the cafeteria. 

  
  
  
  
  


**Author's Note:**

> All these things about me you never can tell  
> You make me sleep so badly invisible friend  
> Turn the dial on my words  
> I can feel them fall short  
> Turn the dial, chime alarm, chime alarm  
> Watch these hands move apart  
> Turn the dial on my words  
> I can see you staying here
> 
> -Whirring, The Joy Formidable, 2009.
> 
> Let me know what you thought :)


End file.
